Hiltek Resource Recoverywith BioActive Services

Heavy oil

Producing Heavy Oil

The biggest upside may be oil that has already been found. Heavy oil, below 20° API, is too thick to flow or pump economically with conventional methods, and steam, the usual answer, is costly. So known barrels sit in the ground.

The resource

Billions of barrels, already found

3.4 billion
barrels of known heavy oil and natural bitumen in the Illinois Basin
Cannot be extracted with conventional pumping (Hiltek estimate)
3+ billion
barrels of heavy oil and tar in western Kentucky’s shallow subsurface
Kentucky Geological Survey
34 million
barrels in every 1% of the Illinois Basin estimate
About $2 billion of oil at $60 a barrel, before costs

The Kentucky Geological Survey notes that the western Kentucky deposits have been developed “periodically for more than 100 years, depending on price and market considerations.” The oil is known. The question is whether it can be produced at a profit.

Why it stays in the ground

Too thick to pump, too costly to heat

Viscosity

Heavy oil resists flowing from the rock to the wellbore and up the tubing, so rates stay low and pumps work harder.

Cold weather

It thickens further as it cools, which makes it hard to pump and sell in winter, a problem many leases already pay to manage.

Cost

Steam, the usual answer, is expensive to generate and handle, so many known deposits never make it past the economics.

How microbes help

Thinner oil that moves

Microbes break down the heaviest fractions of the oil, lowering its average molecular weight, and produce biosurfactants, acids and gas that cut viscosity and help the oil move. In lab studies, microbes cut heavy-oil viscosity by 29–55% (review, 2014).

In BioActive’s test, 18° API heavy oil still poured at 27°F (−3°C) after ChainBreaker treatment.

Infrared thermometer reading on a heavy oil sample, and the treated heavy oil pouring into a jar
18° API heavy oil after treatment, pouring at 27°F.
Field evidence

Heavy-oil results from MEOR field programs

Argentina · Vizcacheras field

Viscosity 115 → 50 cp

About 37,000 extra barrels over three years, at $2.90 per incremental barrel (OGJ).

India · Mehsana fields

Viscosity cut up to 35%

Part of the ONGC and Oil India stripper-well program with TERI (TERI).

China · low-temperature reservoir

1,872 tonnes

Incremental heavy oil from an MEOR field trial (Chai et al., 2015).

Sources for this section